“I’m looking forward to just trying to get to Paris and I hope I am not ill in the next days”.
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Froome went on to praise the behaviour of the crowd during Sunday’s stage which provided a welcome contrast to the shameful events of Saturday, when a spectator hurled a cup of urine and shouted “doper!” at the British rider.
Trentin never held more than a one-minute advantage over the pack – and despite being joined by Canada’s Hesjedal the pair were swept up with around 30km remaining.
Froome said the attacks were “unacceptable on so many different levels”.
Asked if he or his team had considered quitting the race, Froome’s response was simple. The overall leaders need to worry about avoiding crashes as rivals throw caution to the wind in a last gasp attempt to get a stage win, or gain time.
Noisy, hot and no AC: Could a lack of air-conditioning at a hotel where Mark Cavendish’s Etixx-Quick Step team slept last night be partly to blame for his lackluster performance in Sunday’s Stage 15?
Sagan was part of a nine-man breakaway that extricated itself from an initial 27-man group on the rolling opening third of the stage, the 25-year-old clearly eager to consolidate his lead in the green jersey competition and perhaps finally end the hoodoo that had seen him finish second on four occasions this July.
Cummings ambushed two French riders, Romain Bardet and Thibaut Pinot, on the short flat section to the airfield after riding at his own pace up the steep final climb where, he said, “everyone went bananas”. “I’m ready to do it”, he said. “There was no air conditioning”.
Temperatures started in the mid-30s Celsius but soared up to 40 degrees (104 degrees) Fahrenheit.
Giant-Alpecin’s John Degenkolb was second, with Katusha’s Alexander Kristoff third and Peter Sagan of Tinkoff-Saxo finishing fourth.
The Team Sky rider, whose impressive ride up La Pierre St Martin in the first mountain stage raised suspicions like his 2013 ride up the gruelling Mont Ventoux, had urine thrown at him by a spectator during Saturday’s 14th stage.
Australian Michael Matthews keeps cool by dousing himself with water but said that “once you start, you can’t stop” as the body constantly craves more. He credited his Lotto-Soudal teammates for positioning him “in the right spot” for the final sprint.
(AFP) Andre Greipel made it a hat-trick of Tour de France stage wins on Sunday as he won the 183km 15th stanza from Mende to Valence.
Froome leads Colombia’s Nairo Quintana (Movistar) by 3min 10sec with American Tejay Van Garderen a further 22sec back, with twice-Olympic track champion Thomas at 4:54 in sixth place and Dutchman Robert Gesink (LottoNL-Jumbo) in seventh at 6:23.
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Seeking to protect Froome from the prospect of a similar incident, two police officers were guarding the Team Sky bus ahead of Monday’s 16th stage.
